Regular registration is now open for A Midwinter God: Making a Conscious Underworld Journey – the next online course for the Soul Care Insitute (January 9-February 19, 2012). Enrollment is limited to 15 soul care practitioners. Below is a re-post of a previous reflection I wrote about this idea of embracing a midwinter God. If it [...]
Posts in the Cycles and Seasons category
Autumn: The Season of Paradox
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My latest Seasons of the Soul column at Patheos: Song for the Salmon (excerpt) For too many nights now I have not imagined the salmon threading the dark streams of reflected stars, nor have I dreamt of his longing nor the lithe swing of his tail toward dawn . . . I am ready like [...]
Being at Home
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Watching the geese / go south I find / that / even in silence / and even in stillness and / even in my home / alone / without a thought / or a movement I am part / of a great migration that will take me to another place. —David Whyte, excerpt from "What [...]
Sweet Midsummer Blessings (Abbey Sabbatical)
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Watermelon You know what summer tastes like—the pink flesh of a generous earth, this rounded life fully ripe, fully flavored. How could you be ashamed at the tug of desire? The world has opened itself to you, season after season. What is summer's sweetness but an invitation to respond? There is only one way to [...]
Stop by Trust Tending for an interview with me about seasonal wisdom
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The lovely Kristin Noelle has created a beautiful new blog called Trust Tending: Reflections, Conversations, and Art to Nourish Life Beyond Fear. She offers a monthly theme, regular reflections, and these wonderful sketches that are so profound in their simplicity. This month the theme is nature and she invited me to participate in a written interview [...]
Visual Meditation: Savoring Stillness
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When I was in Vienna over Christmas my husband and I took a magical walk on the Winter Solstice through the snow-covered gardens of Schonbrunn Palace. The peace of that foggy day still sings in my heart. Celebrate the gifts of winter with me. Breathe deeply and feel the invitation to savor stillness. Those of you [...]
"To be a saint means to be myself"
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During this week of honoring the Saints and ancestors in our lives, let us turn to the example of the flower, the leaf, the sea, and the mountain of how to be a Saint ourselves, how to stop refusing our own flowering: . . . I look out at everything growing so wild and faithfully [...]
Luminous Wisdom of Night
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The darkness embraces everything, It lets me imagine a great presence stirring beside me. I believe in the night. -Rainer Maria Rilke, Book of Hours The Christian feasts of All Saints and All Souls on November 1st and 2nd honor the profound legacy of wisdom our ancestors have left to us and continue to offer. In [...]
"The Still Heart That Refuses Nothing"
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Lake and Maple I want to give myself utterly as this maple that burned and burned for three days without stinting and then in two more dropped off every leaf; as this lake that, no matter what comes to its green-blue depths, both takes and returns it. In the still heart that refuses nothing, the [...]
Autumn's Call
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Today is the Autumn Equinox and we enter my favorite half of the year. These days have been marked by a heaviness here at the Abbey though. My mother-in-law who has Alzheimer's has been declining rapidly as of late. And in the last couple of weeks our sweet old dog Tune has developed canine cognitive dysfunction, which essentially leads to increased [...]
